


There and Back Again

by frabbity



Category: The Hobbit (2012), The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Kink Meme, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-21
Updated: 2013-06-02
Packaged: 2017-11-25 20:48:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 14,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/642815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frabbity/pseuds/frabbity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fill for the Kink meme. Years before Thorin Oakenshield ever asked Gandalf the wizard to find him a Burglar, he spent years as a wandering smith, taking work where he could find it. Derided by Men and driven from town to town, the finds refuge--and welcome--in the unlikeliest of places: a little village in the Shire. And there he meets a young Hobbit, and a strange friendship begins to blossom.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fill for the Kink meme. Prompt: About twenty years pre-canon, when Bilbo was about thirty, thirty-one years old (17-18 by human standards), a wandering Dwarvish blacksmith came through the Shire. Bilbo fell head-over-heels and started finding excuses to go down to the forge and watch Thorin work. Thorin considered him a bit of a nuisance at first, but over the course of a few months (long winter, rather more business in the Shire than Thorin was expecting, hobbits pay better...you decide why he's staying so long) Bilbo grew on him and they struck up a romance. Then Bilbo's parents find out and all Hell breaks loose.  
> Thorin is discreetly run out of town by a band of angry relatives and Bilbo is told he ran away in the night after stealing from someone in Hobbiton. Bilbo is heartbroken but tries to put it behind him...until twenty years later Gandalf and the Company arrive on Bilbo's doorstep.

The noonday sun was relentless, its hot, dry heat beating down on Thorin’s head, making him yearn for the cool, dark caverns of Erebor. Oh, to be once again safely tucked in the deep recesses of the earth—but to wander down that path of thought only ever led to the same, impotent rage as had consumed him in the days directly following Smaug’s attack. And that rage would be of no help to him now. The past weeks had been lean, with fewer men needing the quality of Dwarven-forged steel than those who would look upon him with suspicion and derision. So he had packed up his belongings, such as they were, and took to the road once more, hoping that the next village he came upon would look more kindly upon Dwarves. He was facing the gloomy prospect of a week of crusty loaf-ends when he was jolted out of his thoughts by a pony’s distressed neigh.  Looking up, he saw a young boy crouching at the feet of a sturdy chestnut pony. He had a moment of shock at the sight of a child so near the danger of a pony’s hooves when the boy turned at the sound of his clunking boots. Seeing the round pink cheeks, slightly pointed ears, and curly mop of fair hair, he realised that it was not a human child but rather a hobbit.

 

“Hullo there!” the lad called cheerily. Saying nothing, Thorin nodded and lifted a hand in greeting. “I don’t suppose you have something I could use to bind her foot up, do you? She’s gone and thrown a shoe!” Drawing abreast of the hobbit, Thorin could see that his hands, although small, handled the pony’s hoof deftly and gently.

 

“I’m afraid I don’t,” Thorin said, “but I do have pull-offs and nippers, I can help you remove the shoe.” He did not often offer his help so freely, but something about the hobbit’s open friendliness, so freely given, made him want to help. Without much further delay, Thorin and the young hobbit, who he learned was named Milo, led the pony back towards the centre of the town, which Milo told Thorin was called the Shire. The old farrier had just passed away a few days ago, Milo informed him, and the Shire hadn’t had a blacksmith in years, getting by trading crops for the worked metal they needed. Listening to the hobbit, Thorin couldn’t believe his good fortune. He could do quite comfortably here, he thought. Sure, these farm folk wouldn’t need much in the way of swords or axes, but he could make hoes and ploughs and horseshoes, and nourish his body with good food and an actual bed in an actual inn, for once, rather than scrapping by as he’d been doing.

Re-shoeing Milo’s pony was the work of an hour, and a day later Milo’s mother brought her kitchen knives to be sharpened, along with a lemon seedcake, which Thorin gratefully accepted. Mrs. Chubb’s delight at how well her knives held their edge soon had her neighbours bringing their knives to be sharpened too, and it wasn’t long before Mrs. Bracegirdle had commissioned Thorin to forge her a large meat-cleaver. Where he once would have sneered at the indignity of working metal for common kitchen tools, he was now grateful not only for the Shirefolk’s custom and coin, but also for their good-natured welcome of his presence in their village, and their habit of bringing him food in addition to payment. Where Men glowered at him distrustfully, the hobbits of the Shire looked at his differences with eager curiosity and  open friendliness. Each day saw a gaggle of young hobbits crowding round the doorway of the forge, the shyer ones ducking out of sight when he looked over to them, the bolder ones venturing in, and the most daring of them asking him questions about what he was doing.

 

And so it was that Thorin Oakenshield, son of Thrain, son of Thror, heir to the kingdom of Erebor found himself explaining to the bright-eyed young hobbits of the Shire the best way to hammer hot steel, and why it was important to temper it only after it had been heated and quenched, and how to ensure that a forge-fire blazed hot and long. Most of the young hobbits came a few times before they were diverted onto other interests, or tugged back to their chores, but one young hobbit in particular turned up almost every single day. He had the fair, curly hair of so many other hobbits, and the same round cheeks, and a pair of dreamy hazel eyes that were always watching Thorin. Unlike the other hobbit boys, this lad never asked questions, never pestered Thorin to let them try their hand at the bellows, and in fact, never spoke a word to him. The dwarf couldn’t quite decide if he preferred the lad’s silence or if it irked him to be constantly, silently watched.

 

It had been three months since Thorin had come to the Shire, and one evening, as he was putting the finishing touches on a new carving knife for Mrs. Burrows, etching a delicate pattern into the handle, he heard a voice say, “I didn’t know dwarves were so good at carving wood as well as forging metal.” He looked up to see the young hobbit who’d been turning up almost daily standing just inside the door, and even from across the room he could see the fiery blush staining the lad’s cheeks. When he said nothing, the hobbit continued, “My name’s Bilbo. Bilbo Baggins. I live up at Bag End, and…and…and it’s very nice to meet you,” he ended, awkwardly. Before Thorin had a chance to respond, though, Bilbo had dashed away, and a moment later Thorin saw him running up the pathway and disappearing over a stile into a nearby field. Thorin frowned. What had that been about?

 

The next day Bilbo came to the forge again, but stayed outside the door, peeking in shyly but not saying a word, and refusing to make eye contact. Thorin was taken aback by the hobbit’s strange behaviour, and frankly, after a whole day’s worth of Bilbo peering round the doorjamb and darting back out whenever Thorin lifted his head, the dwarf had had quite enough.

 

“Either come in if you want to watch, or leave if you want to, but by Durin’s beard if you peer around and then dart back out one more time, I am going to shut this door right in your face!” he growled the next time Bilbo’s head peeked round the doorway. For a long moment nothing happened, and Thorin thought he had actually managed to scare the hobbit away, but then Bilbo inched further into the room, and Thorin didn’t quite know whether to be annoyed at his presence or not. “I, er, I saw the dagger you made for Otto Proudfoot. The handle was very finely carved.” As he spoke, the hobbit had inched closer to Thorin, and was soon standing right in front of him, watching him work.  Under Bilbo’s gaze, Thorin found it difficult to keep track of the pattern he was carving. Putting the knife and his tools on the table next to him, he looked up at Bilbo. The hobbit’s eyes shone with unmasked admiration. Thorin sighed internally. He supposed the warmth the Shirefolk had shown him deserved some sort of return.

 

“So, young master Bilbo, I gather you have some interest in the skills of the Dwarves? I have noticed you come here far more often than your friends.” At his words, Bilbo’s blush darkened and he ducked his head shyly. “I have read about dwarves, but I had never met one before you came to the Shire. And…”

 

“And?” Thorin asked, his voice betraying his growing impatience at the way the hobbit was always so timid and awkward in his presence.

 

“And, well, I’m not so young as you might think!” Bilbo blurted out. “I’m already 32, well out of my tweens! I’ll be of age in less than a month!” He looked into Thorin’s eyes then, quite boldly, his chest rather puffed up in pride at his own maturity, and Thorin was torn between amusement at the hobbit’s innocence, and annoyance at his naïveté. Bilbo coughed awkwardly, and Thorin realised that another silence had fallen between them. “Well, I should, er, let you get back to it...” the hobbit said, backing away slowly as he spoke, his eyes locked on Thorin’s, filled with a sort of pleading. The dwarf nodded, his eyes not missing the look of disappointment that flashed across Bilbo’s face. After the hobbit had left, Thorin let out the sigh that had been building up inside him. Gods’ teeth, but hobbits were strange creatures. He’d met plenty of young Dwarves in his life, all of them eager for the approval of their prince, but no Dwarf had ever been this twitchy and nervous, thank Mahal. He had little patience for tending the delicate sensibilities of people like Bilbo Baggins. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading, and for all the lovely comments! I'm glad you guys are enjoying this!

Over the next three weeks, Bilbo continued to come to Thorin’s forge every day, and each day saw the pair have another short, stilted conversation—always initiated by the hobbit—about one inane topicor another. Thorin tolerated the hobbit’s continued presence even though what he now realised to be Bilbo’s need for his approval grated on his nerves more often than not. Almost all the leaves had fallen from the trees when suddenly, Bilbo stopped coming to the forge.

 

The first day he did not come, Thorin was immensely glad to be relieved of Bilbo’s eager bright gaze and random bursts of inane conversation. The second day, found that the roar of the fire and the clanging of his hammer on the anvil seemed insufficient noise to fill the cavernous silence of his forge. On the third day, he caught himself glancing toward the door every so often, wondering what had happened to Bilbo. On the fourth day, he was forced to admit, after ruining a perfectly good piece of steel by hammering it so long and hard that it became too brittle for use, that the hobbit’s absence had…upset him. After all, Thorin told himself, it had been incredibly rude of Bilbo to turn up when he pleased, and then just disappear without a word when he was bored. Yes. It wasn’t that he was worried about the hobbit, or that he missed him—ludicrous!—he had simply gotten used to his days taking a certain shape, and for Bilbo to change that on a whim, without even the courtesy of informing Thorin, well, that was just bad manners.

 

Sighing as he looked down on the now-useless piece of steel lying on his anvil, Thorin was forced to count the day’s work wasted. He might as well pack up for the day while it was still early enough to go down to the markets. He needed more bread, as well as sausages and ale.

 

The autumn air was cool and fresh against his face after a long day sweltering in the forge, and Thorin relished the feel of it. Around him, the little green plots of land the hobbits called home thrummed with life, children running about yelling and laughing, hobbit men tending their gardens or smoking their pipes while their wives collected the laundry off the clotheslines, the smell of crackly brown leaves dancing in the chill air. A feeling not unlike contentment spread through Thorin’s breast. Who would have thought that a dwarven prince would feel at home here, of all places? This sun-soaked greenery and utter domesticity was as far away from ‘home’ as he could imagine, and yet, despite the unlikelihood of it all, Thorin was beginning to feel like maybe, just maybe, this could be a place he could belong to. Reaching the marketplace, he made his way to Mother Hobbart’s stall, where an array of freshly baked loaves, buns, and cakes were laid out.

 

“Master Oakenshield! It’s a rare sight to see you here at my stall, it is,” the baker’s warm smile accompanied her cheerful greeting. While not all of the hobbits had been as immediately welcoming to Thorin as Milo had been, Mother Hobbard had been one of the first visitors to his forge, bringing with her a half-dozen currant buns the day Thorin had arrived at Hobbiton. He smiled at her now; it would have been impossible not to return her friendly grin. “Good day to you, Mother Hobbard, I trust business has been good?” As he spoke he picked up a seeded loaf, as well as a few sausage-stuffed rolls, and a number of the currant buns as well. They exchanged a few more pleasantries as he paid, and then he moved on to the butcher’s stall to pick some sausages. He as was deciding between the spicy sausage and the herb ones, he heard two of the more gossipy goodwives talking behind him.

 

“Did you hear? Belladonna was distraught! She came over to our smial in tears, she did!”

“No! What happened? Was it Bungo? I did think he’s been acting quite suspicious!”

“No, you didn’t!” the first one tittered, deliciously scandalised. “I was talking about young Bilbo!”

At this, Thorin’s ears perked up, quite against his will.

“What about young Bilbo?” the second gossiper asked, excited at the prospect of fresh juice.

“Well, he was laid up in bed for almost a week! He was struck by the fever, you know, just a week to his birthday!”

“Oh! That was cutting it very close indeed!”

“Oh, yes! Belladonna was heartbroken when he didn’t make it!”

 

At those words, Thorin felt his blood seem to freeze in his veins. Was he hearing this correctly? Bilbo had died of a fever? Without conscious thought, his feet were taking him rapidly across the market grounds, and up the narrow terraces carved into the hillside leading up to Bagshot Row. His mind was a whirling mess of incoherent thoughts and emotions—all week, while he’d been grousing about Bilbo’s bad manners, the hobbit had been lying ill in bed! He’d not even bothered to find out if anything had happened to Bilbo, but immediately jumped to thinking ill of him. If he had but asked, he would have gotten to see Bilbo one last time before he’d, well, died.

 

Thorin still couldn’t quite absorb the information that the young, shy hobbit, so full of curiosity and energy, was dead. Those bright eyes would never again gaze at him in eagerness, never again sparkle with excitement. It was too cruel.

 

Arriving at the foot of Bagshot Row, Thorin looked up the long row of houses. The sight of all the colourful Hobbit-holes, which an hour ago had sent a warmth through his chest, now left a bitter taste in his mouth. The neat rows of circular doors seemed now bewildering rather than cozy. How was he supposed to know which house was Bilbo’s? And, for that matter, what was he going to do once he found Bilbo’s house? The utter futility of his actions crashed upon him in a sudden wave, and a cold ache grew in his chest. Pointless.

 

He should never have come here.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Thorin spun on his heel and stalked down the path. Belatedly, he realised that he had simply dropped his purchases from the baker at the butcher's stall. What the market vendors must think, he could only imagine. With a resigned huff, he made his way back to the marketplace and made quick work of collecting his baked goods from the butcher, picking up a string of spicy sausages and a jack of ale. The vendors still smiled and nodded at him, but there was a wariness to the way they held themselves that told Thorin that his abrupt departure from the market had not gone unnoiced—or unmentioned. Thorin elected to ignore the questions he could see in their eyes, smiling and making small talk to the best of his ability—which was to say, stiffly and somewhat distractedly, but he counted it a triumph that he remained largely coherent.

 

After a dinner of sausages and bread that should have been more satisfying than it was, Thorin decided to turn in early. He lay awake for a good long time, finding it unusually difficult to fall asleep. He put it down to the relatively little hard labour he'd done that day. His mind ran idly through a myriad of memories: chasing Dis down the stone-lined corridors of Erebor, their wild screams echoing madly around them; holding the very first gem he had ever faceted by himself, mesmerised by the reflective smoothness of the sparkling planes and warmed by his father’s pride; carrying his nephew Fili for the first time, just two hours after he'd been born, light golden peach fuzz covering his head and cheeks, a warm and utterly trusting bundle, his eyes already shining with a light uniquely his.

 

Comforted by the memories of his family, Thorin felt the warm tendrils of drowsiness begin to wrap around him. As he drifted off to sleep, a last, crystal-sharp image floated through his mind: Bilbo standing in the doorway of Thorin’s forge, his sandy curls backlit by the sun, a shy smile curving his lips and bringing a sparkle to his eyes. Accompanying it was the question Thorin had unconsciously avoided all afternoon—why had he reacted so strongly at the news of Bilbo’s death. But before his mind could supply the answer, or more likely, shy away from providing any sort of answer at all, Thorin slipped quietly into slumber, although his dreams would be punctuated by flashes of laughing eyes and pink-stained cheeks, and sturdy feet adorned with naught but tufts of hair.

* * *

 The next day, Thorin returned to his forge with renewed determination not to let his strange thoughts—or dreams—distract him from his work. People lived and died—it was the way of the world. This, he, Thorin, son of Thrain, son of Thror, displaced king of Erebor, knew better than most. So a particular hobbit had died. What of it? He was no stranger to death and loss—he had lost his father, his grandfather, his home, his people. Next to that, what was one hobbit? After all, Bilbo Baggins had been nothing to him.

Thus resolved, he threw himself into back into work, determined that that would be that. And it worked. For the next five days, Thorin fixed a cast-iron kettle with a leaky spout, re-set a stone on an heirloom necklace, and crafted a set of wrought candlesticks. All without—too many—disruptive thoughts about a certain Bilbo Baggins. But then, he ran out of work. Not too surprising, really—there was a reason the village had managed to survive without a blacksmith of years. Finding himself at loose ends after finishing up the candlesticks for Mrs. Brockhouse, he decided he’d drop them off—the day was pleasant enough for a walk up the hill.  

 

Delivering the candlesticks took less time than he expected, even after accepting a cup of tea from Mrs. Brockhouse, and Thorin decided he would just wander about and see where his feet took him.

 

It wasn’t long before he found himself, once again, at the foot of Bagshot Row. A queer shiver went through him, the familiarity of the moment taking him back, momentarily but viscerally, to that afternoon less than a week ago, when he’d been standing in the same exact spot, looking at the same long row of houses stretching before his eyes. A well of emotion rose within him, and viciously he tamped it down.

 

Turning on his heel, Thorin made to stride back down the hill and back to his forge, when he was run into by a slight, and slightly soft, figure. His hands went out automatically grasping the figure by the arms before whoever it was could bounce off him.

 

“Oof! Sorry, sorry! I wasn’t looking where I was going!”

 

At the sound of those words, Thorin stiffened, his fingers tightening reflexively. Looking down at the hobbit who had bumped into him, all he saw was a mop of sandy brown curls. It could have been any hobbit in the Shire! But that voice! Bilbo was—dead. The market gossips had said as much. But, surely Thorin could not have been mistaken about a voice he had listened to every day for the past four months? Even as he tried to quell it, a wave of hope grew in his chest, sharp and painful. With a rough hand, he shoved the curls out of the hobbit’s face, ignoring the other’s indignant yelps.

 

“Oy, what do you think you’re doing! Let go of me! Gerrof!” Heart pounding in his throat with every word the hobbit uttered, Thorin finally managed to push the masses of curls out of the way to reveal a very annoyed Bilbo Baggins. For an instant, Thorin was deaf and blind to the world, his ears roaring with blood and his vision whited out. This, how could this be? A chill finger of fear ran down his spine, a familiar and unwelcome companion, the fear that he too had been stricken by the insanity that seemed to dog the heels of the line of Durin. Bilbo’s gasp and the jerk of his body brought Thorin back to himself, but that single moment had shaken him down to his bones. Abruptly aware that he was still clinging onto Bilbo, he released the hobbit forcefully, causing Bilbo to stagger back a step.

 

“Thorin? How…what are you…that is. Um. What brings you to Bagshot Row?” Bilbo peered up at him, the beginnings of a blush already staining his cheeks, and Thorin found that he could not speak, had not the words to express—well, anything. Instead he stared at Bilbo, Bilbo with his hair tousled and shirtsleeves rumpled by Thorin’s hands, eyes shining and cheeks flushed. _Alive_. As the realisation hit, Thorin was nearly overwhelmed by a tumult of emotions and thoughts, all tangled up in each other, none of them fully-formed. All he knew was that the relief and joy he felt at seeing Bilbo alive and well, here, in front of him, were perplexing and illogical in their intensity.

 

Blinking a few times, he realised that Bilbo was still gazing at him expectantly. Right. Bilbo had asked him a question. The silence between them stretched on as Thorin wondered what on earth he could say in response to Bilbo’s question. _I thought you were dead_?  Accurate as that was, it seemed somewhat…melodramatic. And it didn’t answer the question, really. Why _had_ he come up to Bagshot Row? The gods’ honest truth was, Thorin had no idea, himself.

 

And, while he was pondering questions he had not the answers to, how had it come to be that Bilbo, who the market gossips had said had died of a fever, was instead standing before him? The hobbit had felt entirely too solid and real under his hands to be a figment conjured up by his maddened mind—or so he would like to believe. In any case, nothing about this situation made sense. Unknowingly, his brows had lowered into a thunderous frown, and beneath his querulous gaze, Bilbo’s quizzical expression began to wilt.

 

“I, ah, I live just down this way, actually,” Bilbo said, hesitantly. “Would you like to, um, come in for some tea?”

 

And so it came to pass that Thorin Oakenshield, son of Thrain, son of Thror, found himself sitting at a sun-dappled kitchen table, in front of a cosily-roaring fire, a mug of hot tea in front of him, with Belladonna, Bilbo’s mother, bustling around him.


	4. Chapter 4

“Tea not to your liking, dearie? Would you prefer something stronger?” Belladonna chirped as she busied herself fetching a plate of currant buns from the Bagginses’ well-appointed pantry.

“Oh, no, tea is just fine,” Thorin answered, taking a hurried sip and wincing as the hot tea scalded all the way down. In truth, his mind was still a whirl of questions and confusing emotions. Bilbo had been shoved out of the kitchen, leaving Thorin alone in the smial with the hobbit’s mother, feeling more confused and wrong-footed than he could remember ever being.

Belladonna came back into the dining room, bringing with her a bowl of bright red plums. Settling herself across the table from Thorin with her own mug of tea, she let out a contented sigh and smiled warmly at him.

“There, it’s nice to put the feet up and have a nice cup of hot tea, isn’t it now? Here, have a bun, go on! No cause to stand on ceremony, especially after Bilbo’s been pestering you for months! I imagine you’d work up a powerful appetite working in that forge all day.”

“Ah. Thank you,” Thorin managed, taking a bun from the plate Belladonna pushed towards him. He stared at her, trying to organise his tangled thoughts into a measure of coherence.

“You alright there, master Dwarf? You’re looking a mite peaked, if you don’t mind me saying,” the hobbit asked kindly.

“Well, the thing is,” Thorin started, hesitantly. “At the markets, I, well I overheard two of the goodwives talking, and they, ah, I heard that, um.” He cleared his throat awkwardly, unsure how he should phrase it. “Ehm, they mentioned that Bilbo had…taken ill with a fever. And that he had…” here he trailed off, finding himself unable to complete the sentence.

“Ah, yes. I was quite upset about the whole thing, as you can imagine.”

Thorin froze. What?

His confusion and consternation must have shown clearly on his face, for Belladonna stopped and peered more closely at him.

“Why, what’s the matter?”

“You…you were quite upset?” Thorin repeated slowly.

“Yes, of course!” Belladonna returned, looking at him questioningly.

“When Bilbo…died?” Thorin ventured, even more cautiously. Did the same madness that plagued Durin’s folk afflict hobbits as well? What other reason could there be for Belladonna’s cavalier attitude? Quite upset was not how Thorin would imagine a mother would feel at the death of her only son. And yet there Bilbo had been, in front of Thorin’s own eyes and under his hands, and Belladonna too had spoken to him, hadn’t she? None of this made sense, unless Thorin was about to awaken and find that this was all a dream his mind had conjured up.

“Died?” Belladonna exclaimed, and after a moment’s pause—a moment that seemed, in Thorin’s estimation, to have lasted an Age—she burst out laughing. “Oh, my dear, no!” Thorin waited for an explanation, but Belladonna seemed to have trouble containing her mirth. Several times she got it almost under control, only to start laughing again the moment she tried to speak. Eventually, though, her laughter faded down to weak chuckles, and she wiped at her eyes.

“Obviously, I’ve…missed something,” Thorin said into the quiet.

“Ah, well yes. You see, it’s a…coming of age, sort of, ritual, I suppose you’d call it. The Baggins men have all tended to fall quite ill just before their coming of age birthdays—the 33rd, you know. But usually two months or so before the actual birthday. But Bilbo now, well Bungo blamed it on my Took blood, you know, psh!” she waved a hand to indicate what she thought of that idea. “Anyway,” she continued, after a sip of tea, “Bilbo took ill just five days before his birthday, and was in bed a full week! We had to cancel the party, weeks of planning, just wasted! Everyone was quite disappointed, and the Sackville-Bagginses! What a fuss they made! You’d’ve thought we’d cancelled the party just to inconvenience them!” Belladonna snorted and rolled her eyes, her opinion of the Sackville-Bagginses quite evident.

“I see,” Thorin said, slowly, his mind whirling at this new information. For an instant, he felt a hysterical urge to laugh. He had been tormented, unable to sleep or work properly, wrestling with his feelings, because of a fever? A ridiculous hereditary fever? The idea was ludicrous, and would have been laughable if Thorin did not, even now, feel the echoes of the horror and sense of loss that the prospect of Bilbo’s death had filled him with. He barely registered when Bilbo wandered back into the kitchen, and Belladonna recounted his amusing misunderstanding of market gossip, so overwhelming were his mental and emotional disorientation.

Somehow—and he would later have no recollection of any detail beyond fuzzy memories of hot tea and warm currant buns—he managed to carry on a conversation with Belladonna for another half an hour before she began bustling around again, declaring that she had to begin preparing supper, shooing Bilbo and Thorin out of the kitchen. Never one to overstay his welcome, Thorin bade her farewell, thanking her for her hospitality, only to have his words waved away as Belladonna pulled him into a hug and told him to come back any time for a bite and a chat.

 

* * *

 

Bilbo and Thorin walked down the gently rolling hill of Bagshot Row without speaking, and by the time they had reached Thorin’s lodgings behind the forge, the silence that stretched between them was thick with tension. Stalking into his living quarters, Thorin headed for the sturdy wooden table in the middle of the room, unceremoniously removing his coat and dumping it in a heap on the table without bothering to see if Bilbo had followed him in—he knew the hobbit well enough by now to know without looking that Bilbo would follow him in. Sure enough, from somewhere behind him and to the right, Thorin heard Bilbo give a dry, awkward chuckle, clearly uncomfortable with the prolonged silence. “That was rather funny, I suppose. I can’t believe you mistook what you heard in the—“ His words were abruptly cut off when the dwarf whirled on him suddenly. Thorin supposed he cut a menacing figure at that moment, advancing on the shorter, slighter hobbit, the late afternoon sun slanting through the window casting harsh shadows on the planes of his face. Bilbo began to shuffle backwards, backing away from him, and Thorin could see that he was making the hobbit nervous. He couldn’t, however, bring himself to stop.

“Funny?” He asked, the low pitch of his voice dropping the question into the room like a chunk of rock, heavy, jarring. He could see Bilbo’s throat work as he swallowed nervously, backing up until he hit the far wall of the room.

“I thought you dead.” He said, biting each word off, almost vicious in his barely-controlled rage—a rage he could neither comprehend nor control. He was now close enough to see the hobbit’s pulse fluttering rapidly along the side of his throat.

“I thought you dead!” The words were a shout, punctuated by his fists thumping hard into the wall at each side of Bilbo’s head. Bilbo let out a little squeak and shrank back against the wall, eyes clenching shut for a second. The sight stirred something within Thorin, a sharp, hot ache he couldn’t name. “I thought you dead,” he said again, and this time the words were barely a whisper, his voice breaking on the last word, and his eyes falling shut against an onslaught of emotions he hadn’t the faintest idea how to deal with.

Feeling a soft hand on his chest, Thorin opened his eyes and looked down into Bilbo’s face. The young hobbit’s eyes seemed to glow. His hand on Thorin’s chest was warm and the heat of it spread through the dwarf.

“I had no idea,” Bilbo said, his voice low and tremulous. “I didn’t realise you would worry, or that you would think…”His voice trailed off as, almost of its own volition, Thorin’s hand came up to cup Bilbo’s cheek, his fingers burying themselves in the soft curls at the hobbit’s temple, his thumb barely brushing the corner of Bilbo’s mouth. The hobbit’s beardless skin was soft and smooth, and the sensation of it under his palm was alien, exotic, and utterly compelling. It filled Thorin with an unspeakable tenderness, and a fierce desire to protect this tiny, soft creature from any harm, to never let him out of his sight. Bilbo swallowed again, his eyes locking onto Thorin’s, and the dwarf could see that it wasn’t fear that filled Bilbo’s eyes now. He lowered his head slowly, never breaking his gaze from Bilbo’s, stopping when his lips were a hairsbreadth away from the hobbit’s. He felt more than heard Bilbo’s sharp intake of breath, and then Bilbo was kissing him, and everything in Thorin’s world that had been thrown into upheaval since that fateful day in the marketplace, seemed at once to settle back in its place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been such a long time since I updated! Work's been crazy, and I was really really stuck writing this. I'm still in two minds about it; I'm not sure at all if this works. Tell me if you hate it! 
> 
> (also, I'm off for a holiday tomorrow, for a week, so the next update's going to take a while too, sorry!)


	5. Chapter 5

It was, without a doubt, the sweetest kiss Thorin had ever experienced. He wasn’t, by any stretch of the imagination, an inexperienced lover. He’d had dalliances with dwarven lasses and lads, torrid flings best not talked about, and had even had his heart stomped on once or twice. But never in his long years had Thorin Oakenshield ever been kissed quite so sweetly. Nor indeed had _he_ ever kissed anyone this sweetly, not even when he’d been but a young stripling, convinced he had found the love of his life. Bilbo’s lips were warm and firm, slanting across Thorin’s chastely, and the hand not on Thorin’s chest came up to curl around his wrist, his thumb gently stroking over Thorin’s pulse. With a shiver, Thorin lifted his head from Bilbo’s. The hobbit’s eyes were closed still, and as Thorin watched, they blinked open slowly, and a shy smile began to blossom on Bilbo’s face as he nuzzled his cheek slightly into the hand Thorin still held to his face.

The sight brought an answering smile to Thorin’s face, and for a while, there they stood, Dwarf and Hobbit, smiling foolishly into each other’s faces while the autumn sun shone warmly on their faces. They might have stood there a great deal longer, had an errant wandering cow not lowed loudly outside Thorin’s window. Startled, Thorin let his hand drop from Bilbo’s face, and the motion dislodged Bilbo’s loose grip on his wrist. Thorin was suddenly keenly aware of the band of hobbit-warmed skin on his wrist cooling in the air.  

“I should probably go. My mother will be wondering what I’ve gotten up to again.”Bilbo said shyly, ducking his head in a manner Thorin found ridiculously endearing. He nodded as Bilbo looked up again, and watched the hobbit back out the door slowly with a wave before dashing down the path leading away from Thorin’s lodgings.

It was only after the hobbit had moved out of sight that Thorin realised he was still smiling. 

 

* * *

 

The next afternoon, Bilbo arrived at Thorin’s workshop as the dwarf was polishing his axe, having just cleaned it—no reason to let a good weapon go ignored just because it seemed unlikely he would have use of it here in Hobbiton. The dwarf looked up from his work at Bilbo’s shy “good afternoon”, looking questioningly at the sizeable wicker basket hanging from the crook of the hobbit’s elbow.

“I thought we might go for a picnic,” Bilbo said, a smile making his eyes dance. “The woods are very nice this time of year, or we could go up the Hill, the view of Hobbiton from there is quite wonderful,” the hobbit continued. “Anywhere, really. There are lots of quiet spots we can have a nice afternoon tea.”

A picnic? Thorin couldn’t remember the last time he’d had the luxury of making a meal—particularly a supplementary one like afternoon tea—an outing. The idea struck him as rather ridiculous, not to mention frivolous. And yet at the same time, under the sway of Bilbo’s good spirits and bright smile, also adorable, and even—fun. Slowly, Thorin felt his lips curving in an answering smile as he nodded at Bilbo.

“A picnic sounds…nice.”

And that was how Thorin, son of kings, descendent of the line of Durin, found himself sitting on a blanket in a meadow, enjoying the delights of a hobbit-prepared picnic basket: seed cake, cold chicken, a wedge of sharp cheddar with quince jelly, juicy pears, and even a flask of hot tea. The day was mild for late autumn, the sun bright and warm, and the wind a gentle breeze, hardly enough to stir the crackly leaves that blanketed the ground. They ate leaning against the trunk of a massive chestnut tree, pockets of surprisingly comfortable silence peppered by conversation Bilbo drew out of Thorin with unexpected ease. The young hobbit had a curious mind, and asked a great many questions about the lives and ways of Dwarves. Bilbo did not bring up the kiss of the previous day—although it was never far from Thorin’s thoughts—but the moment they had shared seemed to have swept away a great deal of Bilbo’s characteristic shyness and reserve.

“What is it like to live deep underground?” Bilbo asked presently.

“Well, much cooler in the summer than living aboveground, for one thing. And…” Thorin struggled to put it into words. It just _was_. He had grown up living deep within the mountain, and it was hard to describe something he had taken for granted all his life. “It was safe.” He continued haltingly. How to express the solid security of living deep within the earth? “The roots of the Lonely Mountain go deep into the earth, and the mountain itself provided utter security and stability for the dwarves living within.” _Or at least it had, until a dragon had swooped out of the blue and smashed that security to bits._ Bilbo pondered this for a minute, then:

“Are there windows? How do you light the rooms and passageways?” Thorin laughed a little at this, surprising himself.

“There are no windows such as those in your hobbit hole, no. But there were great glass clerestory windows cut into the side of the mountain at the upper levels to allow sunlight in, and lightwells to carry it the lower levels.” _All of which had probably been destroyed when the dragon attacked._ “Of course we burned torches as well, but dwarves do better with the dark, I think, than hobbits.” At this, Bilbo nodded vigorously.

“I should think so! I can’t imagine not seeing the sun every day!” Bilbo’s earnestness brought a small smile to Thorin’s face, and he pushed aside the ever-present anger that arose in him at the thought of Smaug. For a while, hobbit and dwarf sat in companionable silence, Bilbo munching at a piece of cheese while Thorin picked at the remains of the chicken.

“Do dwarves grow crops?” Bilbo suddenly wondered aloud. The abruptness of the question startled another chuckle out of Thorin. Bilbo’s questions were so uncomplicated and innocently asked that even though thinking of Erebor was both nostalgic and painful, Thorin found that he could not refuse answering—nor did he want to.

“No we do not, master hobbit. We leave the growing of crops to those more suited to it, both in interest and in skill. Dwarves care little for crops and plants, although some healers keep small plots of herbs. We are mountain-dwellers, rock-cleavers, metal-workers, warriors; we have few farmers or gardeners.” Bilbo hummed a quiet acknowledgement at this.

“I suppose it just seems odd to me,” Bilbo mused. “To stay inside, in the cold and dark, working with metal and stone, when you could be outside, in the sun, tending to living things.”

“Ah, but stone and metal are living too, in their way,” Thorin said, shaking his head. “Metal, it has a will of its own. Sometimes you can bend it to your purpose, but the best smiths learn to heed the metal. And as for stone…an uncut stone, you can look at it and see the gem it is meant to be…” He trailed off. In Westron, the words sounded too fanciful and whimsical. He shrugged awkwardly, embarrassed, and opened his mouth to dismiss it, but Bilbo was staring at him with an expression of amazed wonder that he just shut his mouth again, settling back against the bole of the chestnut once again. The hero worship in Bilbo’s eyes was undeniably gratifying, but at the same time made Thorin slightly uncomfortable. Once again, the kiss they’d shared the previous day rose to the front of Thorin’s mind. He’d known, of course, that the young hobbit admired him, but…a kiss was a different matter. And yet Thorin could not deny how utterly _right_ the kiss had felt. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Bilbo still watched him, although now the hobbit looked rather like he was trying to figure out a particularly tricky puzzle.

“You sound as if you miss it,” Bilbo said, finally, and it was half question, half observation. Thorin nodded slowly as he considered this. Of course he did, although it was hardly that simple. _Missed_ seemed to imply a sort of wistful longing, a simple desire to return to happier times. But what Thorin felt was a great deal more than that. Erebor was lost. The way of life that he spoke of was gone, lost to ash and dragon fire. What he missed wasn’t merely a past he’d had to grow up and leave, it was an entire life that had been snatched away by a greedy vicious worm, with any chance to fight back dashed by the heartless betrayal and cowardice of the wood elves.

Thorin felt the all-too familiar tangle of emotions tugging at him, chains he could never break out of: the hot flush of rage, the bitter burn of betrayal, the hard bite of failure, and overlaying it all, the cold metallic tang of guilt. The dragon had destroyed lives and taken his home, the elves had left the dwarves of Erebor to burn and die and wander homeless, orcs had overrun Moria, killed his grandfather and driven his father mad, and the fury of it all threatened to overwhelm Thorin. But worse, far worse, was a quiet voice would ask, crystalline and sharp and delicate as a shard of opal, _what about you, Thorin?_ And to that, he had no answer that he could give with pride or honour. He had failed to protect his people, failed to save his grandfather, failed to counsel his father, failed to step up to the responsibilities of a prince of Erebor. Without conscious thought, Thorin’s fists clenched, even though they would serve no purpose here and now. Who knew how far he would have spiralled down the dark path of anger and recriminations had Bilbo not distracted him by nudging Thorin’s knee with one bare foot.

“Toss that over here, would you?” the hobbit asked, pointing to a fallen chestnut on the ground. Thorin picked it up and eyed the prickly little thing questioningly before Bilbo reached over and plucked it out of his hand with a mischievous sparkle in his eye. Thorin had a moment to wonder if he had imagined the flash of sorrowed empathy he saw in Bilbo’s eyes, and then Bilbo was saying blithely, “Since dwarves don’t farm or grow things, I’m guessing you’ve never played conkers, have you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys, I'm so sorry this took so long! This chapter totally kicked my butt. It was such a fight getting this out, but I think I'm pretty satisfied with the way it turned out. Let me know what you think!


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of stuff going on here, I suppose I should warn for...Dwarven jealousy/possesiveness and a somewhat unhealthy/unequal relationship. 
> 
> (I've never posted trigger warnings before, so please forgive me if I've missed something out, and do let me know if that is the case, and I'll add them right in.)

The passage of the next month saw Thorin and Bilbo spend nearly every day together. As autumn moved gradually into winter, Thorin’s days fell into a strangely tranquil sort of pattern. Bilbo would come to his forge—or, increasingly, as there was less and less smithwork needed, to Thorin’s lodgings, and the two would spend the day together in a variety of ways.  One Trewsday, Bilbo brought Thorin into a nearby plum orchard, and the two filled a bucket with juicy damsons, eating as they went, until an angry shout had them dashing out in a hurry. As hobbit and dwarf scrambled madly over a low stile, almost choking with laughter, plum juice still running down their chins, Thorin realised the sounds he was making could technically be termed giggles.

Not that he’d take it lightly if anyone were to say so to his face, of course.

When they had made it safely away and into the woods, Bilbo collapsed against Thorin, still in a fit of laughter, and Thorin stumbled down onto the base of a large oak, Bilbo’s weight knocking the breath from his chest. As they quietened, Thorin realised that he had one hand tangled in Bilbo’s curls and another fisted around the hobbit’s shirt. Bilbo’s right hand still grasped the pail of fruit, which had spilled out half their haul in the tumble, while his other arm was wound around Thorin’s waist. Thorin gazed down at Bilbo, and a now-familiar feeling of overwhelming tenderness filled his chest. Shifting the hand he had in Bilbo’s hair into something more like a caress, he gently turned the hobbit’s face up towards his own. Slowly, he leaned down, somehow hesitant to move too quickly. He felt Bilbo tremble, watched the laughter fade from his eyes, and for a heartstopping second, Thorin feared he had misread the moment. He and Bilbo had not kissed since that first, fateful time, what if this was not what Bilbo wanted? What if—

But then Bilbo shifted in his arms, letting the handle of the pail clunk against its side, and buried his hand in Thorin’s hair, just behind the dwarf’s ear, sending a shiver down Thorin’s spine. Bilbo arched into Thorin’s hold, rubbing his head into Thorin’s hand like a cat, his eyes luminescent and slumberous.

“Thorin,” Bilbo whispered, the two syllables filled with longing and pleading and a wealth of emotion the dwarf could not name. The sound of his name on Bilbo’s lips broke the last of Thorin’s hesitancy, and he let his lips descend onto Bilbo’s. The kiss was sweet, slow, perfect. Bilbo hummed low in his throat, and Thorin felt awash in sensation. Fingers pulling lightly at his hair, a warm arm wound firmly around his waist, soft, fine curls nestled under his palm, and the utter sweetness of kissing his hobbit.

His hobbit.

_His_.

A sudden wave of sheer possessiveness coursed through Thorin, thick as molasses, and hot and heady. A low growl made its way out of the dwarf’s throat, and the tenor of the kiss changed abruptly. Placing his hands firmly on Bilbo’s waist, Thorin lifted the hobbit— _his_ —and shifted him so that they were facing each other. Angling his head, Thorin deepened the kiss, nipping at Bilbo’s lower lip, and with a sound that was half sigh, half groan, Bilbo returned with a fervour that took the dwarf prince utterly by surprise. The kiss was like a rockslide—powerful and earth-shaking, and in its wake, the landscape of Thorin’s life would never be the same again.

Breaking apart for air, Thorin rested his forehead on Bilbo’s, trying to rein in a mad swirl of thoughts and emotions. His feelings for this hobbit ran deeper and stronger than he could understand, and the realisation left the dwarven prince utterly shaken. But before he could even attempt to sort through what he was feeling, Bilbo had lifted his other hand from Thorin’s waist and was idly running his fingers through the dwarf’s hair, and Thorin closed his eyes against the intoxicating sensation. Suddenly, Bilbo’s thumbs grazed the shell of Thorin’s ear, eliciting a sharp gasp from the dwarf. Opening his eyes, Thorin caught the knowing smile playing at the corners of Bilbo’s mouth, and the sight made him laugh breathlessly.

“You are a wicked creature, Bilbo Baggins!” he exclaimed, trying for a stern look but knowing that he failed, being unable to keep an answering smile off his lips. The hobbit laughed, shameless, and brushed his thumbs over Thorin’s ears once again, quite deliberately, before tugging gently on the lobes. In retaliation, Thorin leaned down, pressing a hot, open-mouthed kiss to the underside of Bible's jaw before nipping at the soft skin gently. Bilbo let out a hitched exhale, his fingers massaging Thorin's scalp mindlessly as Thorin trailed kisses down the slope of Bilbo’s neck, sucking and licking as he went. The hobbit let out a choked sound that was part Thorin's name, part breathy gasp, and the dwarf thought he'd never heard a lovelier sound. With a low hum, he reached up to once again capture Bilbo’s lips with his own in a searing kiss. The hobbit uttered a moan of his own, melting into Thorin and tightening his fingers in Thorin’s hair, and the dwarf had a moment of sudden, sharp clarity in which to be intensely, thoroughly grateful for all the circumstances that had brought him to this moment.

 

* * *

Two days later, Thorin went down to the market once again. He’d finished buying bread, sausages, and candles, and was just lingering at the fruit seller’s stall, deciding between pears and plums, when the sound of a familiar laugh floating on the wind caught his ear. Turning, he caught sight of Bilbo at the edge of the market. Happiness flooded through Thorin in a sudden burst, before he realised his hobbit was talking to another lad, one who had his hand on Bilbo’s arm. His good spirits vanished, and his eyes narrowed, a steely glint replacing the smile they had held seconds ago. All thoughts of fruit abandoned, Thorin strode towards the pair, scowling.

As he approached, he saw the unknown hobbit lean in to whisper something in Bilbo’s ear, and the two hobbits burst into laughter, clutching onto each other. Thorin’s mood turned even fouler. How dare this hobbit grab at Bilbo in this manner? How dare he paw at Thorin’s hobbit like this? And how could Bilbo not stop him?

“Bilbo,” he said, by way of greeting, when he’d reached the two hobbits.

“Thorin! Good morning!” Bilbo said, flashing him a smile before turning back to his companion, and saying something beyond Thorin’s hearing, his arm still under the strange hobbit’s hand. Very deliberately, Thorin turned his gaze upon the other hobbit and nodded once at him, his eyes never leaving the other’s.

“Am I interrupting you and Master…?” he asked, voice flat. A part of him knew he was overreacting, but the larger part of him was seized with infuriation that some other person dared to behave in such a familiar way with his hobbit. Bilbo looked over at him, a small frown on his face.

“Oh, this is Falco Bolger, a good friend of mine. Falco, Thorin Oakenshield.” Bilbo made the introductions smoothly enough, but Thorin could see that the hobbit was disconcerted. Clearly, Thorin’s tone of voice had alerted him that something was amiss.

“Pleased to meet you, Mister Oakenshield,” Falco said.

“Good day, Master Falco,” Thorin returned. It was at once a greeting and a dismissal. Thorin turned then to Bilbo.

“I would speak with you, in private, Bilbo.” Thorin did not miss the way Bilbo glanced over at Falco, but his focus remained squarely on his hobbit, ignoring the other completely.

"Of course, Thorin.” Bilbo said. Thorin’s pleasure at Bilbo’s easy agreement was soured a moment later, when Bilbo turned back to Falco, smiling apologetically as he grasped Falco’s arm. 

“I’ll come by to your smial tomorrow for tea, then, Falco? I’ll bring some of my mother’s scones that you like so much,” Bilbo said, laughing when Falco nodded enthusiastically at the mention of scones. The two hobbits talked for a few more moments while Thorin glowered at the sight, and then, finally, it was just him and Bilbo.

“Thorin, is everything alright? What _was_ that?” Bilbo exclaimed, before Thorin could even get a word out. The dwarf blinked, stunned. Bilbo was questioning _him_? He ignored the fact that Bilbo’s eyes were filled with confusion and worry.

“ _Me_? I would ask you the very same question,” Thorin growled, words leaving his mouth before his mind had the time to consider the wisdom of such a response. Distantly, he noted that Bilbo’s face had darkened with displeasure, but his mind threw up the memory of the two hobbits leaning against each other, overcome with laughter, and a fresh wave of anger rushed through him.  “What do you think you were doing, behaving in such a manner with, with—“ Words momentarily failed Thorin as to how best to describe Falco, but he was saved the need to complete the sentence when Bilbo jumped in.

“With what? A friend? Yes, what _was_ I thinking, having a conversation with a friend, in broad daylight, here, in the market?” Well, when Bilbo put it like that… But,

“You were… _clutching_ at each other, you, you were all over each other! That is no way to comport yourself, it is disgraceful. And behind my back!”

" _Behind your back_?” Bilbo interjected, his voice approaching an indignant squawk. “Did you miss the part where we were in the middle of the marketplace in the middle of the day? We were not doing anything illicit, so I’ll thank you to stop behaving like you caught me doing something I ought to be ashamed of, when really, _you_ should be ashamed of how you are acting! You come over and, and _loom_ over two people having a conversation, and you chase Falco away, and you call _my_ behaviour disgraceful? I might not know much about dwarven culture, but surely this can’t be what your people call good manners.” The shy, retiring hobbit Thorin had gotten to know was gone, replaced by this almost-vibrating bundle of indignant outrage, and the dwarf was momentarily distracted by the transformation. Eventually, though, Bilbo’s words sank in, and the seething anger in Thorin’s gut was replaced with a nauseating feeling where it had been, and a dawning realisation that Bilbo might have a point.

“I…” Not for the first time in his acquaintance with Bilbo—forge fathers, not even for the first time today—words failed Thorin. Swallowing, he set his jaw and braced himself to say the words he hated.

“Bilbo, I apologise. I—I overreacted. When I saw you two, I…I…assumed the worst. I’m sorry. Dwarves are by nature possessive of what belongs to us…” he trailed off, awkward, realising too late what he was implying. Bilbo opened his mouth to speak and Thorin held his breath. How would Bilbo react?

“Don’t give me that ‘dwarves are naturally possessive’ excuse! You are not among dwarves and even if you were, people are not things, to belong to other people. That is no excuse for your discourtesy, Thorin Oakenshield. Don’t tell me I belong to…” Bilbo stuttered to a stop as the import of what Thorin was saying hit him. His mouth opened and closed a few times, blinking rapidly. After a long silence, the hobbit opened his mouth again to speak, and Thorin saw what could have been a look of wonder in Bilbo’s eyes, but before the hobbit could get a word out, from across the market came a woman’s voice calling his name.

Both hobbit and dwarf turned to see Belladonna hurrying across the market square. Bilbo hastened towards his mother, and as Thorin watched, mother and son held a hurried conference, with Bilbo casting a look over his shoulder at Thorin. After a few moments, Bilbo turned and gestured that he needed to leave, and still somewhat shell-shocked by the events that had just transpired, Thorin lifted a hand in farewell, watching his hobbit dash away behind his mother.

 

* * *

That night, it came to Thorin in a dream, fully formed and in exquisite detail. A sturdy blade, not too long, wider at the base and tapering to a delicate point at the tip, set into a hobbit-sized hilt, inlaid with wood at the pommel, and carved in a swirling motif of leaves, vines and a single, spiny chestnut conker.

He awoke in the cold dark of the night, breathless from the clarity of his dream, fingers trembling with the need to put hammer to hot metal, to make vision reality. In his long years, Thorin had only felt such an urgency once before, just after he’d completed his metalsmithing apprenticeship. Then, what had come to him had been the broadsword every apprentice had to make before he could become a journeyman. Then, though, he’d felt the excitement and fervour of youth, an eagerness to prove himself worthy. Now, what roiled in his blood was something quite different. Something he’d never thought he’d feel after the burning of Erebor.

The gift of an item wrought from a dream-vision was a custom that had, in the recent decades, fallen out of practice. It was a hold-over from a different time, a time when courting couples had decades to go through all the rites and rituals involved in ascertaining interest, establishing a relationship, exploring the depth of that relationship, and finally, making an overture of serious intent. After the dragon had attacked Erebor, these had all become traditions few dwarves had the patience for. More, they had become symbolic of a lost era, relics of an irretrievable past, and Thorin had not thought that he would ever be visited by such a dream, nor that he would feel thus compelled to create such an item—and for a hobbit, no less. Realising that sleep would remain elusive while this urgency smouldered within him, Thorin rolled out of bed, dressed hastily in his work clothes, and strode into the forge to light the forge-fires.

Thorin worked for five days straight, and for the first time in a long, _long_ while, the thoughts and worries and anxieties that hammered incessantly in his head throughout his waking hours fell away without conscious thought or effort. He put all of his concentration and skill into crafting the dagger, focusing on it with a single-minded clarity of purpose, and everything else ceased to be important. He discarded his first attempt when the steel didn’t have the sheen he wanted, and spent hours hunting among the piles of wood in the woodworkers’ sheds for the perfect piece for the inlay. When at last he held the dagger completed in his hand, Thorin felt awareness seep slowly back into him, the world beyond the driving urge of the past five days coming gradually back into focus.  So consumed had he been by his vision and fervour that he had hardly marked the passage of time, nor had he really registered that in those five days, Bilbo had not come to visit him.

Now, holding the dagger in his hands, Thorin felt almost lightheaded. It felt surreal, to hold in his hands something he’d first seen in a dream and had then forged in a state of such utter concentration it seemed to be a dream as well. He blinked, feeling rather like he'd only just come fully back to his senses, was only now fully aware of his surroundings and his self. And suddenly, he became acutely aware of two things: firstly that he was absolutely ravenous, and secondly, that he missed Bilbo with a fervency that was almost a physical ache. He did not, though, dwell on when such a dependence on seeing Bilbo had grown in him, focusing instead on what he could do to set himself to rights.

After polishing the blade and handle until they gleamed, Thorin cleaned up first his workspace, and then himself, before falling into bed in a deep slumber. He awoke a day later, more refreshed than he’d felt in recent memory, and completely ravenous. A hasty meal of bread and sausage later, he set out to find Bilbo, the dagger safely ensconced in a leather pouch he tucked into the pocket of his coat. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...lots of completely made up head-cannon in this chapter. Also, this really isn't an all-happy-and-fluffy relationship, I think Thorin at this point is quite emotionally messed up, and Bilbo's innocence and hero-worship of Thorin adds to a rather problematic relationship between the two of them. 
> 
> And finally, I'm sorry I've been so slow with updates! I have no good excuses or reasons, just the sad fact that it's been taking a long time for me to a) write stuff, and then b) tweak that stuff so that it's less crappy.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, I don't even know what to say. I'm _so_ sorry this took forever. Real life intruded, and I just kind of..lost steam. Also, I got _really_ distracted by the Ri brothers. I'm sorry, I really am, and I'm going to try to update more frequently.

Thorin fretted all the way up the Hill to Bag End. It was completely unlike him—he, Thorin Oakenshield, did _not_ fuss and worry endlessly like a wittering fool. He decided what he would do, and then he did it.

So this nervous fluttering in his belly, this prickling feeling up and down the length of his spine, this cursed dampness in his palms—they were _not_ happening.

Mahal blast it. 

Endlessly, the thoughts chased each other round and around his head. What if Bilbo refused the dagger? What if he accepted it before Thorin could fully explain its import? What if—

There it was, the now-familiar round green door of Bag End.

Heartbeat thudding so loudly Thorin wondered for a moment if he even needed to knock, he swallowed, and tried to compose his expression into something resembling its usual composure before lifting a hand to knock on the cheerful green door. He was suddenly very aware of his breathing and the weight of the leather pouch in his pocket. After what felt like an interminably long wait, the door swung open to reveal a sandy-haired, neatly-dressed hobbit who was wearing a small frown. This had to be Bilbo’s father, the resemblance was almost uncanny—Thorin felt almost as if the door had opened into a time fifty years into the future and he was staring at a Bilbo who had lived a comfortable, domestic life, never setting foot outside the safety of the Shire.

The thought seemed to reach out and grab Thorin by the throat. What was he doing? He had not thought this through at all. Bilbo was no dwarf, and Offering him the dagger would not— _could_ not—mean the same thing it did were he to Offer to another dwarf. The realisation was a cold stab to his heart, and for one wild second it was all he could do not to turn around and run, all the way out of the Shire, all the way back to the nearest dwarven settlement. But then Belladonna came bustling out from inside the smial, and the tightness in his chest loosened inexplicably, and Thorin felt a small smile grow on his face.

“Who is it dear? You’re letting all the warm out! Is it—oh.” When  Belladona saw Thorin, her friendly expression seemed to stiffen a little, although surely that was his imagination, because in the next second, she was smiling again.

“Master Oakenshield! Good day.” Bilbo’s mother said in greeting, and Bilbo’s father flicked a sharp glance at his wife.

“Good day, Mrs. Baggins. I’m looking for Bilbo, is he around?”

“No, he’s not,” Bilbo’s father said, and the words seemed heavy with some sort of unspoken meaning. Into the subsequent tense silence, Belladonna added, “He’s visiting his cousins, down in Tuckborough. He won’t be back for a few days.” Her words were like a dash of cold water in Thorin’s face, and after thanking her, he made to leave, only to be halted when Bilbo’s father spoke.

“Bungo Baggins, at your service, I’m sure. Won’t you come in for some tea? I’d like to meet the dwarf my son has been...spending so much time with.”

Thorin II Oakenshield was the son of kings, he had killed orcs, engaged in political negotiations with slippery elves,  led his people into exile, faced a Mahal-cursed _dragon_ , for crying out loud. But somehow, faced with this short, soft, fussy little hobbit and his politely-worded order—and make no mistake, it was an order—Thorin did not for a second consider refusing. 

And so, with a bow and a hurried “Thorin Oakenshield, at your service”, Thorin found himself once again seated in the Bagginses’ warm kitchen, although this time the atmosphere was decidedly less warm and cosy.

“So, Master Dwarf, Bilbo—and Belladonna—tell me you’re a wandering smith. How long do you plan to stay in Hobbiton?” Thorin swallowed. This was a question he had been conscientiously not-thinking about. At his silence, Bungo continued, “I mean, I assume you aren’t planning to settle down here for good, are you? We don’t have dwarves around here, but from what I’ve read, your people live in caves and mines, underground, with your own kind.”

“Well, that’s true enough, sir,” Thorin answered, slowly, thinking his answer through. “I suppose I haven’t really thought too far ahead. I…hadn’t actually planned on staying here as long as I have, but, well, business was better than I expected, and everyone was so welcoming. I’ve enjoyed my stay here so far.” He ended lamely, aware that he hadn’t actually answered Bungo’s question.  The unimpressed look on Bungo’s face said he was too.

A tense silence filled the kitchen, starkly at odds with the comforting crackle of the hearth-fire, and Thorin found himself forcibly tamping down on the urge to fidget under Bungo’s gaze, feeling uncomfortably like he had somehow failed some sort of test. Eventually, it was Belladonna who broke the tense silence again.

“The thing is, dear, is that we’ve all noticed that you and Bilbo have…grown close. And we’re concerned that you may have a different idea of what’s happening than Bilbo does.” Belladonna sighed. “Bilbo thinks he’s all grown up, and mature enough to know what he’s doing, but really, he’s only 33. And you, well, I’m sure you’re a sight older than that.” And what could Thorin say to that? It was true.

“The neighbours have seen you two…canoodling, shall we say. And if you can’t take responsibility of Bilbo’s heart, well then you haven’t any business fooling with it, Master Dwarf.” Bungo’s mild hazel gaze had hardened to a steely glint, and Thorin found he could not hold the hobbit’s eyes.

“Clearly, you do not disagree,” Bungo continued, waiting a beat to see if Thorin would say anything. When the dwarf remained silent, he went on. “I can’t imagine the Shire was ever anything more than a temporary way station to you, and it might be time for you to consider taking your leave, Thorin Oakenshield. Hobbiton has gotten on pretty well without a smith for quite many years, and we shall continue to do so. And you would probably do well to move on to whatever it is you have planned for yourself. Surely you can see that this was never going to end well.” When Thorin still said nothing, Bungo continued, “It would probably be best if you left before Bilbo comes back.” At that, Thorin looked up sharply at the older hobbit’s face.

“You want me to leave immediately,” he said. His flat tone making it more of a statement than a question, but Bungo nodded nonetheless, his eyes hard.

How had everything gotten so out of control? He had come here today to Offer Bilbo the dagger, and now, now the day had turned into the complete opposite of anything he might have imagined.

Yet he could no more dispute the Bagginses’ words than he could sprout wings and fly. What _could_ he offer Bilbo? He had nothing, no home, no future, nothing but a burning sense of injustice and a vague plan to right the wrongs that had been visited on the dwarves of Erebor. All the same, he knew he couldn’t possibly stay here in Hobbiton forever.

Caught between the irrefutable logic of Bungo’s words, and his own burgeoning sense that this was _not_ how things were meant to go between him and Bilbo, Thorin was lost.   

He left Bag End in a blur, mechanically treading the path back to his lodgings. Stepping into the space he’d been inhabiting for the past months, he stared at the small room. It was little more than a shack nestled into a hillock, a rough-hewn table in the centre, a bed against one wall, and a small kitchen tucked into one corner. When he’d first been shown it, he had not thought he’d ever grow comfortable living in such a space, full of wood and light and hardly enough sturdy depth to it. But now, its familiarity was a hard ache in his throat.

There was the table he and Bilbo had eaten many a meal on, there on the bed was a soft warm blanket Bilbo had brought for him, there on a shelf in his pantry a wrapped up loaf of seedcake he’d bought thinking to share with Bilbo, and there in the little round window, a little daffodil Bilbo had brought and left and nagged at Thorin to water. Suddenly, the dwarf could not bear to stay in his cosy wooden shack a second longer. With long strides he crossed the room to the little wooden cabinet he kept his belongings in.

In a few short minutes, he had shoved his tools, bedroll, money, and the few sets of clothes he had, into his pack. He pulled the straps tight, cinching the top down to hold the contents snug in the slightly too-large pack, and buckled the top closed. The clink of the metal fastenings suddenly sounded small and sad and lonely in the quiet stillness of the room, and Thorin’s hand clenched reflexively around one worn leather strap as he struggled to master the tumult of emotions within him.

This felt wrong. He didn’t want to leave Hobbiton, not like this, not without saying goodbye to Bilbo.

On a hard exhale, Thorin stood. His eye caught on the blue blanket spread out in a bright swathe on his bed, and before he could think too much about it, his hands were already unbuckling the straps that held the pack closed. He reached out hurriedly to bundle the blanket into his pack before strapping his axe onto his back and his sword at his waist. Then, hefting the pack onto his back, he strode out of the little shack without a glance back.

He would head East, for the Manish town of Bree, and then on to the Iron Hills. It was time to pay his cousin Dain a visit.

It wouldn’t be an easy journey, not by any stretch of the imagination, but Thorin rather thought he could use some orcs to kill.

It was time to leave Hobbiton behind.


	8. Chapter 8

The inn of the Prancing Pony was noisy, and filled with far too many Men. Still, it was one of the few inns along the Great East Road where Dwarves were welcomed, and the journey east was going to be difficult enough that Thorin wasn’t about to turn down an opportunity for what might be the last good meal and comfortable bed until he reached the Iron Hills. It was with an unpleasant jolt that Thorin realised he found the cacophony of the Men’s ale-soused merrymaking unbearable after the long months of quiet Hobbiton life. What sort of dwarf found the boisterous atmosphere of a well-stocked tavern _too noisy_? Bree was only two days’ walk out of Hobbiton, but already Thorin felt a pang of homesickness for the cosy idyll of the village he’d left behind. Taking a swing of his ale, he hastily banished the notion. How could he be homesick for a place that was never a home to begin with?

Reaching into his jerkin, Thorin took out his map and spread it out on the table, studying it. He wasn’t too far away from Fornost, where a small refugee camp had been set up. If memory served him right, Dwalin was scheduled to make a routine visit to the camp this month. Impulsively, Thorin decided that he would make the small detour to the Fornost camp to see if he could meet up with his oldest friend. He could use a dose of Dwalin’s reassuringly gruff common sense. And even if Dwalin wasn’t there, it would do Thorin good to be around dwarves again. Taking another swig of his ale, Thorin smiled, nodding a little to himself. In a few days, he would be among his own people again, and before long, everything would go back to the way it had been, back to normal.

The next morning, Thorin headed north for Fornost, glad to leave the town of Bree behind him. He didn’t know it then, but it would be almost two decades before he would find himself back in the Prancing Pony, where a serendipitous meeting would change...well, everything.

* * *

The road to Fornost was an easy one, the weather was brisk but not uncomfortably cold, and having only just set out, Thorin was well-provisioned with food and water. His feet were unused to long days on the road, but Thorin found he rather enjoyed the soreness in his muscles. No, what was difficult was not the physical task of making his way to Fornost, but the unshakable feeling that every step he took was in the wrong direction.

_Stop._

No, Thorin refused to think about what Bilbo would think when he returned home only to find out that Thorin had left. He refused to contemplate how Bungo and Belladonna would explain his absence. He refused to miss the cosiness of a hobbit-built fire, the heartiness of a hobbit-stocked larder, or the warm, uncomplicated comfort of a hobbit’s cheerful company. He most certainly refused to dwell on thoughts of soft lips and ardent kisses, tinged with the sweetness of plum juice, or fragrant with the scent of tea. That way lay madness. The past was in the past, and there it would stay. No good could come of dwelling on it, no matter that the manner of his departure rested uneasily upon him. What was done was done, and so Thorin did what time and circumstance had given him great skill in—he pushed his thoughts and feelings and memories and wishes deep into a secret corner of his soul, and moved on.

It never occurred to him that his memories of his time in Hobbiton had become as cherished and bittersweet as those he had of Erebor in the days before the dragon came.

As it turned out, Dwalin was not at the Fornost camp when Thorin arrived, but the camp’s chief informed Thorin that his burly shieldbrother had sent a raven saying he would be arriving within the week. Thorin decided to put off his visit to Dain a little longer—the road to the Iron Hills were long and arduous at best, and treacherous at worst, and Dwalin would be an excellent travelling companion.

Three days later, Dwalin arrived, and Thorin got utterly, roaringly, unable-to-walk-without-assistance drunk. He hadn’t planned to, when he’d suggested having a pint or two at the nearby tavern, but that was just how the evening turned out. Dwalin matched him pint for pint at the start of the evening, but when it became clear Thorin was going to drink himself into a stupor, Dwalin drew back and let Thorin plough through mug after mug of ale while he sipped his slowly.

The night passed in a blur, and the next morning Thorin awoke feeling as though Mahal himself was using his skull as an anvil. When he managed to pull himself together enough to stumble blearily out of his tent, he found Dwalin waiting for him. His oldest friend glanced up at him, set aside the throwing dagger he was sharpening, and wordlessly presented Thorin with a mug of dark, viscous liquid, and an amused smirk.

It was a mark of how wretched Thorin felt that he didn’t even pause to wonder what Dwalin had put in the concoction, he just lifted the mug and downed the contents in three gulps. As the thick liquid hit his already-roiling stomach, Thorin felt his stomach lurch, and for one horrible instant, he thought he was going to throw up, but the moment passed, and he felt marginally better.

“How could you let me get _that_ drunk, Dwalin?” The hint of amusement in his voice belied any censure his words might have implied, and besides, it had not been the first time, nor would it be the last, in all likelihood. Unsurprisingly, Dwalin only widened his smirk and shrugged. Affecting a scowl, Thorin used the now-empty mug to nudge Dwalin further down the bench he was sitting on. “Budge up then, and let a dying man sit.”

The pair sat in companionable silence for a time, Dwalin going over the arsenal of weaponry he carried on his person, and Thorin leaning back and soaking up the warmth of the sun, enjoying the peaceful sounds of blades being cleaned, checked and sharpened. It really _had_ been too long since he’d been back among dwarves.

A few days later, Thorin was poring over his maps with Dwalin.

“We can take the road round the base of the Weather Hills, and then travel along the Hoarwell into—”

Dwalin sighed, the third time in as many minutes, and Thorin looked up at him, exasperated.

“Alright Dwalin, what is it?”

Dwalin met his gaze steadily, a thunderous frown on his craggy face. He was silent for a long moment, and Thorin thought he knew why so many quailed under Dwalin’s fierce glare. When he still said nothing, Dwalin let out a sound that was half-sigh, half-growl, and stood, raking his hand over his now-bald head in frustration.

“Dain and the Iron Hills are far to th’ East, Thorin. That road is long and hard and filled with goblins and orcs and Mahal knows what else. You know I’d follow you anywhere without a question if you had reason, but you don’t, do ye!” He whirled abruptly on one foot and paced the few steps up and down the length of the small tent agitatedly before turning back to Thorin.

“What can Dain offer? What would be the point of travelling a year to the bloody Iron Hills? Your people need you, Thorin. Y’ve been traipsing around ever since just after the settlements were put up, and no one’s said anything. But enough! Tents and lean-tos in whatever miserable spit of land we could beg or find unattended? That is no way for any dwarf to live! You are a king, Thorin, _our_ king. You may want to be a wanderer, but that is not a freedom you have!” Breath coming heavily, face flushed, Dwalin paused for a moment, as if to say more, but then, with a muttered curse, he stormed out, leaving the tent juddering wildly in his wake.

Thorin stared after his oldest friend, completely thunderstruck.

The night that passed was one of the longest and coldest Thorin could remember. The coals in the brazier burned down into a smouldering pile of ashes, and the candles guttered and went out, until he was left alone with his thoughts and Dwalin’s heated accusations, feeling numb and utterly lost. The molten core of rage within him seemed to have burnt itself down into nothing, and Thorin wished he could rekindle its heat, but he couldn’t.

Dwalin’s words echoed painfully in his mind, slicing through the mantle of anger and bitterness Thorin had gathered around himself and used as an excuse for his actions in the decades since Erebor had fallen. Dwalin was a warrior, blunt and honest and straightforward; for him to say what he had— _you may want to be a wanderer, but that is not a freedom you have!_ —shattered any illusions Thorin might have held on to about himself. Dwalin was no statesman like his brother, and yet, he had seen into the heart of the matter far more clearly than Thorin, who had been taught the responsibilities of kingship from before he could even remember.

And if his oldest friend in the world had reached the inevitable end of his patience with Thorin, what must the other dwarves of Erebor think of their king? Did they too think that he had abandoned them to be an itinerant smith, wandering from town to town, a good-for-nothing king who had failed them? With a hot rush of shame, Thorin realised that although he had never forgotten that he was a king to his people, he had clung so hard to his bitterness at the loss of Erebor that he had forgotten that he still had a duty to his people. If he had lost a kingdom, they had lost their homes, and for the past few decades, he had been too wrapped up in his own anger to see that.

And so, as the wee hours of the night marched steadily on towards dawn, Thorin wrestled with his anger and shame and guilt, until, as the first rays of morning light hit the tallest peaks of the tents, he came to a decision that he could be at peace with. Dwalin was right—of that he had no question or argument. He would be a proper king to his people; they deserved a home and new lives, proper lives, and he would do all he could to provide that for them.

By the time most of the camp had bustled awake, Thorin had washed up and changed, tired from his sleepless night, but strangely refreshed. He stepped out of his tent with an improbable smile on his face; he had an old friend to apologise to, and plans to make.

* * *

For the next decade, Thorin devoted himself to his people. There was hardly time to spend thinking on what could never have been when there was so much to do. He went from refugee camp to refugee camp, bolstering spirits and helping with what needed doing. He learned to pitch tents and patch them, learnt when to commiserate with those who were discouraged, and when to pull on the mantle of their king and demand excellence from them. He learned to plant and harvest crops of root vegetables, utilising what meagre space the camps could spare for purposes other than living quarters. He worked alongside his people, drank ale with them when it could be afforded, celebrated births and mourned deaths together with them.

He learned, in other words, what it truly meant to be a king to his people.

His fate, his duty, was not that of his father or grandfather, to be a king watching over days of peace and plenty, cementing alliances made in earlier times, forging new bonds with neighbouring kingdoms. No, he was a king in exile, and his duty was to his people, to every single dwarf of Erebor. And while before, this knowledge had burned within him, gnawed at him, a small but constant ember of anger and bitterness at the utter destruction of what should have been, in time he came to see that this was his lot—his to do with what he would; his burden but also his privilege.

He would not be a king seated far above and detached from the people he ruled. He was one of them—their fears, cares, and worries were his, as were their joys and triumphs; he suffered hunger and the bone-deep fatigue borne of endless hard labour, same as they did. He knew them, and they knew him, their king, their leader, yes, but also one of them.

It was more than six years after he had left Hobbiton before Thorin was able to bring all of his people to the more permanent settlement at the Blue Mountains. It had been no easy task wrangling the agreement of Blue Mountain’s Council of Elders to let hundreds of refugees settle in their mountain, but between Balin’s measured counsel, Dwalin’s ferocious glare, and the quiet wit and steely will of his sister Dis, Thorin managed. For sure, the quarters of the Ereborean refugees were little more than quickly-built wooden shacks—the underground mountain dwellings were occupied by the dwarves native to the Blue Mountains—but it was still a vast step up from canvas tents and bedrolls. Thorin moved into a modest suite of rooms with Dis, Fili, and Kili, and tried hard not to think of the last wooden shack he’d lived in.

By the time another eight years had passed, the displaced dwarves of Erebor had well and truly settled into their new homes in the Blue Mountains. The settlement was thriving, and his people were safe, happy, and well-provided for. There were even dwarrows who had never known a home other than the Blue Mountains. But still, Thorin felt…restless. Itchy. Unsettled. His people were happy enough, settled here, but still, this was not their home. Together with the Elders, Thorin and Dis had made every effort to integrate everyone into life here in the Blue Mountains, but Dwarves were a territorial people, and tensions inevitably flared between the natives of the Blue Mountains and the refugees. No matter what, Thorin and his people were not truly Dwarves of the Blue Mountains, and they would never be seen as such. And, if he were being honest with himself, Thorin had to admit that he no real wish to. The Blue Mountains were not his home, no matter that this was the longest he’d lived in one place in decades, no matter that his family were all here, no matter that his people were living peacefully and well here. He was a dwarf of Erebor, that had to mean something, even here, even now.

He knew he wasn’t the only one who felt this way. He had seen Dis going through a trunk that was filled with what little they had left of Erebor—the richly-embroidered clothing and the heavily-wrought jewellery that proclaimed them to be royals of the line of Durin, all they had managed to take with them had been what they had worn on their bodies. He had seen the sheen of tears in his sister’s eyes as she had run her hands over each item, tears that had been gone by the time she had replaced everything neatly and locked the trunk back up. Balin and a few of his more skilled scribes had started re-writing the histories of Erebor, replacing those that had surely been turned to ash when the dragon attacked, and the deep sadness in his friend and mentor’s eyes whenever he worked on those tomes was unmistakable to Thorin. And as for Dwalin, well, his old friend had inked more than a few pieces of his skin in memory of Erebor. Over the years, the two of them had shared many a pint of ale; when drunk, Dwalin would invariably lean in close to Thorin and ask, serious as a priest, whether Thorin would accompany him back to Erebor to “slay that stinkin’ dragon right quick”. They never spoke of it when sober, but with the deep understanding that their long years of friendship had forged, Thorin knew that Dwalin missed Erebor no less than he himself did.

Still, it would have remained nothing more than a constant, nagging feeling, had it not been for a chance encounter with a particular wizard, in a certain tavern Thorin had not thought he would ever have reason to visit again. 


End file.
